Creature Comforts
by DebbieB
Summary: Someone always leaves a pillow and blanket for Miss Tracy when she passes out on the couch. Probably the only Tracy and Alice femslash ever written. UST.


She was curled up on the couch when I found her. Passed out, I guess, so I stopped to watch her there. It wasn't the first time I'd come across her, out cold from too much Scotch and Quartermaine politics.

She's funny when she sleeps. Her hair never seems to stay in one place--it has a mind of its own and doesn't care one whit about Miss Tracy's ego. She must've been tossing and turning a lot, because her hair is a riot--sticking every which way out in all directions.

Miss Tracy sleeps like most of us pose, except for that hair. She never seems to get smudged, or drool, or flatten parts of her face from sleeping too long on it. She's like something out of a 30s black and white movie, perfectly mussed in all the right places.

She'd kill me if she knew I've watched her like this, more times than I care to admit. There's just something about a sleeping woman that fascinates me, and I can't help myself some times. I love to watch her eyes move under their lids as she dreams, love to watch the shifting emotions on her face as they race across her features, unguarded and unashamed.

It's the only time she seems vulnerable. I could kiss her or strangle her, and she'd never know until it was too late for either.

I know why people loathe Miss Tracy. I've worked for her family too long not to know. She can be downright evil at worst, just plain bitchy at best.

But when she sleeps--

I'd better get back to bed. You never know when she's going to startle awake, and the last thing I want is her to find me here. I can't take the risk….I just can't take the risk.

I wondered how long it would take her to go this time. She took her time tonight, watching me the way she does. I tried my best to keep still, to simulate sleep to her satisfaction.

But she always gets frightened away. Some noise or shadow will catch her attention, and she's gone, silently, just like she comes.

Alice has been watching me sleep for years. Alice has been watching me for years.

It didn't take much to find out why she left her last position--some trouble with the boss's daughter. No, the P.I. said, she didn't do anything inappropriate. But the young woman was afraid to have a lesbian in the house and made trouble for her.

I'd suspected from Day One that Alice was a closet case; I had gaydar back before there _was_ gaydar. But it suited my purposes not to out the woman, as she was amusing in an obnoxious way and managed to wrestle control of the household fairly efficiently.

It wasn't until Luke had come into the picture that I began to notice things, furtive looks and sudden tension.

Alice loves Luke. Alice flirts with Luke.

But she watches me sleep, and that's what I notice.

How Alice struggles to keep Luke close, because where Luke goes, so do I.

How Alice snaps and snarls at me more when Luke is around.

How the more Luke torments me, the happier Alice is.

How Alice watches me sleep.

More often than not, recently, I've just let myself fall asleep on the couch. Maybe it's ego, maybe loneliness. But I like the way it feels to be watched, and Alice would never enter my room uninvited.

I like the feeling of the Alice's eyes on me, the feeling I get being studied, observed, analyzed. I like the sound of Alice's breathing, quiet and shallow, like she's holding her breath to keep from awakening me.

Once, right before my wayward husband returned from the Maarkam Islands, after Alice had practically strangled the private investigator I hired to find Luke, I felt her strong fingers brushing the hair from my eyes while I snoozed. I felt warm breath on my cheek and the brush of lips against my forehead.

The next morning, I woke with a blanket over me and a pillow from the guest room under my cheek.

I have to admit, I can't really fathom why I let her get away with it. Why I let her continue with obviously inappropriate behavior. It isn't any good for Alice, teaches her all sorts of bad habits. And it isn't like anything was going to come of it. Despite a couple of experimental flings in school, I'm basically heterosexual. I'm also married, and not about to risk losing $15 million by having an illicit affair with my mud-wrestling housekeeper.

But part of me wonders what it would be like to lose myself in those strong arms, to bury myself in Alice's breasts and explore her soft body. To let the woman adore me, not in secret, but in the light--in candle light, perhaps, with champagne and a huge bubble bath where Alice could play handmaid and wash my hair and massage my shoulders.

Oh, I know it could never happen, because the lines between servant and employer are very sharp in this household, especially where I'm concerned. Alice would never pursue me, and I would never let myself be caught.

But it's nice to imagine.

Alice left a pillow right next to me on the table, one of the really nice ones from the guest room, and one of the down comforters we got from Switzerland. They feel wonderful as I wrap them around me.

They smell like Alice.

THE END


End file.
